A Tear in the Fabric
by knitzkampf
Summary: On the way to Yavin, there are some important things to take care of. Luke, Han and Leia on the Falcon, just after they escape the Death Star in A New Hope.


The ship was damaged by the recent fight with the Empire, but it was functioning. As was Leia. At least, she was trying. Gradually, she was coming back to herself; she felt, with every argument the captain instigated, a rise, a memory, of who she was. The Empire had done a lot to her but she had emerged and she was determined to make herself whole again.

She had scorned the captain for his ship. How did she even know for sure the ship belonged to him and not Luke? At the time she hadn't even known he was a captain. She referred to him, in her mind, as The Man. The One with Luke.

Maybe she had felt his pride. And wouldn't it be nice, to have someone proud of her? But now, sitting in the cockpit, she felt badly, for if she were a ship it's how she would look.

Bruised. Rough. The ship had been a prisoner, the same as her. She needed the ship, for the time, for a gauge. The farther they flew the tighter her focus became.

The captain was having the R2 unit do a diagnostic, and he was angered and concerned, but he wasn't frightened. His ship would take them somewhere.

And he was letting her stipulate where. Which was a start, she figured. Then she lifted her eyes to the transparisteel window, and wondered, _of what?_

If she could wrest back control. If she could figure the right thing to do...

The ship could keep running. She could keep them safe, Luke and The Man, and his Wookiee partner, and they would just fly on forever, one step ahead, continuing with repairs, until the bruises were no longer visible. Or maybe, as impossibly as they had escaped the Death Star, The Man would be able to locate and remove the tracking device, and she could retransmit the plans, and...

She left the cockpit, careful not to step on the hem of her gown, which had been saturated with a filthy liquid when she stood in the garbage masher. The dampness had spread upward through the fabric like a plague; The Man had attempted to keep her out of the water by lifting her up onto a high pile of trash but she kept falling down. Her dress was part dingy gray and part pristine white where wet separated dry. The fabric was grown heavy with dirt- Imperial dirt; this was an important distinction; it wasn't her dirt- and she had stepped on it a number of times during the escape.

Trod upon, popped into her mind. Downtrodden. _The gown; not me. I am not downtrodden. I escaped._

The Death Star was tracking them, of that she was certain. So, though they escaped, they were being pursued.

"Can we still make hyper even though the lateral controls are gone?" she heard Luke ask the captain.

She needed the men, too, she realized. For the first time in her life, at least that the Princess of Alderaan could remember, she needed… help.

Luke still looked so sad, and it was too bad he only had a gentle camaraderie with The Man; Leia found a fog was leaving her eyes; the result of decision. The captain had plugged in the coordinates but he wanted to know more than where.

Luke thought he was being unnecessary and a pain. It was how Leia learned The Man's name. "Han, c'mon. Let it rest."

"No. I wanna know why," Captain Han was looking at her with the same scrutiny he gave the diagnostic report. "Why are you going to your Rebellion if you insist they're just going to follow us?"

"They're able to follow us anywhere," Leia rejoined. The answer had numerous possibilities, but there was only one decision she wanted to make, and now it was done she was relieved. "The fleet is at Yavin. We won't have another opportunity to launch an attack. Or would you rather I say it's where you'll collect your reward?" She was pleased to see he made a face at that.

She had stumbled off the Death Star, feet tripping on her own gown. Everything unraveled and she didn't recognize herself. But she was becoming familiar; the Princess, self-reliant and smart. She wasn't in tatters, not mentally anyway. Torture was only an act, she told herself. The Death Star was in pursuit because she won.

In fact, the Death Star wasn't giving chase. She was leading, and it was following.

She breathed deeply. "I won't have another world put to risk by the Death Star. It's the Rebellion, or it's the end of the galaxy."

"That's puttin' it kind of dramatic," Captain Han said, looking irritatingly pleased at Luke, "don't you think?"

"I just want to wash," Luke blurted.

Luke had a way of avoiding being lured into their battles, and though once or twice she had caught him rolling his eyes, Leia didn't hold it against him. She liked Luke; she thought if it wasn't true they'd all be dead in a few hours, they could be- pals. And she wondered how she came to think of that word, when she knew so many, but it fit. They could be pals.

It was the ship, she realized. It was rubbing off on her. It had a certain _feel._ The Man and Wookiee just didn't fly it; they played chess and they fixed things and said words like pal. And now she was aboard it, and the ship said, _rest a bit._

Luke also had a way of effectively shutting them up. The captain straightened from the nav'puter and regarded Luke with a lengthy stare and then transferred it to Leia. "You both do stink," he said disapprovingly.

"And you don't?" Luke challenged. "We were all in that garbage masher."

"You got pulled under, remember? That sludge leaked under your armor 'cause you had your helmet off. I," Captain Han declared proudly, "remained standing. And she," he pointed at Leia, "is wearing fabric. And it's wet, and it's stinking up my ship."

Leia began a new argument. He was her whetstone, she saw. She could sharpen her blade on him but it would not cut. Her eyes lit on the matted fur of the Wookiee's legs, and she began accusingly, "Your so-called rescue didn't exactly have you coming out smelling like a rose."

Captain Han was up for it. "If you hadn't shot the wall-"

The Wookiee Chewbacca made a loud complaining noise, and Luke compromised, "We all could use a clean up."

If Luke was her pal, then Captain Han was her... not pal. Nemesis? No. Antagonist? She had to pause to reflect on this. Both- pal and antagonist- indicated a level of interaction a princess did not usually get to enjoy. It indicated an equality. As Princess, Leia's inner circle was filled with advisers of varying viewpoints, and she had to know that behind their counsel was their own motivation. But these two men she trusted. Luke because they could be pals, and she had lost all others. Han because he tried to keep her dress dry, and she needed that.

And because Luke liked them both he was something Captain Han and the Princess could agree on. They set about prioritizing repairs, gathering tools, and cleaning up.

The ship was a light freighter, built longer ago than the captain was old, so he couldn't be the original owner. From all his talk, Captain Han had apparently made a few upgrades, but obviously, Leia thought dryly, none of them cosmetic. The freighter was originally designed to work the space lanes and not for long trips in hyper. The new hyperdrive engines, the missile launcher, the sensor suite- none of that made living aboard the freighter more comfortable. There was a rehy unit instead of a full galley, and the 'fresher contained a handheld sonic shower.

They rummaged for something to change into. Captain Han didn't have much, a couple of dark pants and several shirts, but his socks were actually quite fun, striped and colorful, and both Luke and Leia pulled them over their feet. Leia selected a shirt, and she was small enough and he tall enough that it covered her thighs but she was self-conscious in it. The pants wouldn't do; they were far too big. She tugged the hem of the shirt downwards.

"How about my poncho?" Luke suggested, rolling up the cuffs of Captain Han's pants, too long on him. "Maybe the head opening will go around your waist."

Luke needed the voyage, too, Leia thought. The poncho was his last remnant of life on Tatooine, and as he watched her try to fit it up over her hips, she knew she wouldn't wear it even if she was tiny enough. Instead, Leia grabbed a small blanket she found in the crew quarters and wrapped it around her waist and let Luke wear his poncho after he emerged from the 'fresher. Chewbacca the Wookiee was apparently watching them closely, for he brought her a small alligator clip which would keep the blanket from undoing at her waist. He spoke at length.

"First Mate Chewbacca says your hands should be free," the protocol droid translated for her.

"Thank you, Chewbacca," Leia responded.

"It is so you can help with repairs," C-3PO added, and Luke rolled his eyes.

"I think my hair is still dirty," he declared, wrinkling his nose. "Do you smell anything?"

Chewbacca jumped into their conversation. His language was completely undecipherable. Leia had never heard anything like it. The Wookiee disappeared into the 'fresher.

"He says each strand must go thru the sonic," C-3PO translated.

"Each strand?" Luke repeated, dismayed. "That'll take forever." He plucked at his hair.

"I do smell it," Leia said apologetically. "You need a bigger shower. A water one, preferably."

"Will they have one on base?"

"I doubt it will be water."

The Wookiee emerged, holding a comb with fine teeth. The sonic, plugged into an extension, reached the threshold.

Luke made a reluctant groan. "Thanks, Chewbacca." He turned to Leia. "I'll be no good at this. It's gonna take forever."

Leia clucked. "It won't. Let me. Sit on the floor."

It was another exercise, one of time and patience. Leia sat on her knees behind Luke, mentally organizing sections of his dirty blond hair, raking it with the comb and holding it taut to let the sonic blow through it.

Their silence was comfortable yet separate. They both were thinking of things too big to talk about, Leia thought. Finally, Luke ventured, "Feels kinda good." His head made to turn around toward her but Leia held it in place. "Did you get your hair wet?" he asked. "Yours is pretty long, I bet."

Leia shook her head. "Maybe a few drops hit it but I won't undo the buns when I wash."

"What do I call you?" Luke asked. Not knowing appeared to distress him a bit. "Your Highness? Princess?"

Usually beings did call her by title, Leia reflected. But not friends. "I'd like you to call me by my name. Leia," she told him.

"Strange, isn't it?" Luke mused. He sounded sleepy. "We were just running for our lives, and Ben got killed, and you're a princess, a prisoner of the Empire, but you're doing my hair."

"It's the ship," Leia said, but she didn't mean it as an insult. "We have to get used to the new."

Luke nodded, and the hair slid out of the comb. "Yeah," he said after a long moment, his voice thick. He was thinking of General Kenobi, Leia knew, for when he spoke again, he mentioned his mentor. "Han was surprised Ben didn't know of it."

Leia loaded the comb again. "What's the name?"

"Solo. His? Han Solo. Oh, you meant the ship. _Millennium Falcon,_ I think."

 _Millennium Falcon._ It didn't mean much. She didn't think the captain had a thing for birds, but it was a good enough name. "Captain Solo," Leia repeated softly, almost to herself. The handheld blew into the air. "Better than what I was calling him."

"What? Something better than- what did he say? Your Worship?"

"-fulness. Leia shook her head, smiling slightly, not about to tell him. "Nothing."

"Mm," Luke hummed, sounding somewhat relaxed by the movement of the comb through his hair. "I'm sorry he's been a bit of a jerk to you."

Leia smiled again. "Not your fault. It doesn't bother me in the least." She waved the comb around. "I suppose he does all this when he makes port. Washes his clothes, takes a good shower. Eats a good meal."

"If he's got the time. He's a smuggler. I bet he leaves places in a hurry often."

"Like we left the Death Star."

"Yeah. He shoots his mouth, he shoots his blaster. We shot out of Tatooine," Luke brought his palms together and slid one higher. "It could have been for the droids, but he told Ben he had bounty hunters after him."

"No wonder he's been clamoring for a reward," Leia said dryly.

"That was my fault," Luke admitted. "I was trying to hit on something he could use. Like an excuse. Since we wouldn't make it to Alderaan, I knew he lost his fee...Would your father have paid him?" he asked. "I don't know where Ben was thinking he'd get money, 'cause I know we didn't have it."

Leia was surprised the casual talk of Alderaan didn't kill her. She thought she should break, but she didn't. She kept working on Luke's hair. "My father would have covered expenses. He wouldn't have called it a reward, though."

"I guess not. But he- Han- was covering, for something. Kept saying things, in opposites. First he wanted to fight, then sit and wait. So, when I heard you were on the Death Star too I tried to find something that would get him to help."

"Money." To her own ears Leia sounded a little bitter and sad.

"Right. But it clicked." Luke tried to turn his head again. "I bet it's different now, now that he's met you."

Leia tsked. "He told me distinctly he's in it for the money."

"I know-"

"He was pointing a finger at me in emphasis."

Luke sounded like he was smiling, "I know, I heard him. I told you: he looks for a reason that lets him off the hook."

Leia shook her head. "Well, I would hope there'd be more to a person than something so shallow as money."

"People have done worse for less," Luke said, quite unhelpfully. He patted the back of his head, and Leia noticed with satisfaction he had cleaned his fingernails well. "I can get the rest. I'm sorry to keep you. I'm not going to fuss about my clothes too much- do you think I should? I'll be issued a uniform, right?" He rubbed his hair again, suddenly shy. "Thanks. I'll go see if Han needs any help."

Leia nodded. "I'm going to work on my gown. I won't end my mission wearing a blanket."

She sat on the floor outside the 'fresher, moving the handheld over her gown, working in small sections, following the tiny rows of round stitches or else it was too overwhelming. Her decision to Yavin was made and she was firm in it, and her thoughts wandered. She steered away from the mission and how she was only supposed to bring the technical readout of the Death Star to the Rebel Alliance. Now she was bringing the Empire too, but that had always been a risk. As was the risk of capture. Had anyone calculated the risk of the Death Star actually being used?

The same time she reheard _you may fire when ready_ she dropped the handheld and bent over the gown, clutching it.

It was torn. She must have caught it on something in the garbage masher, she realized. As tears went, it was large. Several inches of nothing was between the fabric on either side. A tiny piece of thread dangled out the back, not enough to recover the exposed edges. and she realized several yards had unraveled before being snapped off. The surviving thread was too short to be able to save the others.

She breathed out, desolate and pained. _As if the galaxy wasn't enough. Now my gown._

She fingered the hole, watched the surviving stitches carefully as she manipulated the fabric. _You tore it,_ she reasoned with herself. _In your escape._ Ridiculously, she wondered if Luke or Han would blame her for it.

The hole stared at Leia, black and empty where earlier there was something. It reminded her of space, of black holes and gravity. It reminded her of all that had happened, how she couldn't think of it. Maybe she wasn't so different than the captain- she had to hold on to something, and it couldn't be the truth.

He spoke in opposites, Luke had said. What was the opposite of death? She forced her mind to remember how the goddesses created Alderaan from their fingers. Maybe they could do it again. One took the green of the nebula and dyed the trees; another took the blue from the heat of the sun and put it in the sky. The planet was woven. It was a fabric, just like her dress.

Fiber was symbolic where she was from. Art, dress and hair. And she had ripped her gown, and Alderaan was gone.

The goddesses made Alderaan from their fingers. She could fix it, she thought. or she could leave it, too, because she was Alderaani. But that was like accepting it, accepting the Empire, and they hadn't managed it all, had they? No, she was still here, and it was she that invited them to Yavin. They were coming, because of her. And she would see the Death Star destroyed, and that would help. Or she would die, and that would be fine too.

Leia stowed the handheld back in the 'fresher and folded her gown neatly and lay it on a bunk. Then she smoothed her blanket-skirt down and went to look for the tool locker.

She pulled out drawers. There were spanners, bolts, nuts, screws, hammers, chisels even. None of these would do. She moved over a cabinet, where Han apparently stored findings, leftover items from installations or things he had taken apart and thought he might still have a use for someday. Clasps, hex keys, rings, spokes….

She picked up a spoke.

She had learned to knit on Alderaan. It was a needle art that spread across the galaxy and was introduced to Alderaan, but still. Somehow, in Leia's mind, the two- Alderaan and knitting- were closely tied. Perhaps the same way the captain would feel about repairing lateral controls and the _Millennium Falcon._

Goddessess... Leia closed her eyes. Her class, the group of fourteen nobles she attended school with, all her life, was called a Knot. And one day, before the eldest of the Knot would turn thirteen- when they all still wore sleeveless gowns, the mark of childhood, and wore their hair simply up, not braided- their tutor had them knit sleeves. An Alderaani rite of passage.

It was all so... customary. She'd never questioned it, never asked why. It was just the way it was. But Luke had his poncho- did it _mean_ something? Could he knit? Boys on Alderaan didn't knit sleeves. They got new tunics, though, with sleeves. Leia's brow furrowed. Boys went camping when they were twelve. And some might hunt. Not all.

She was the only Princess in the Knot, but the others were high-born. One day their tutor distributed thin, slender rods, very much like the spoke she held now, with tapered ends. The girls of the Knot chose a silkened fauna wool, created in a secret process by members of the Twisters Guild, in brilliant blues of yellows and purples. No longer would they wear brushed floral fibers.

She had not been enthused about this project, and her face softened at the memory. She had ranted to her father about how the coming of age dress was really about finding a marriageable prospect, and she did not want to waste time making a sleeve, because there was no one she wished to marry. She would be queen one day; why give someone an early advantage? Her father had laughed her off indulgently, but Leia saw now how she was. She had only been twelve years old, but she did know her politics. She didn't knit well, but she understood society.

She had not been very good at it. The girls of the Knot giggled at her. In this instance it was acceptable for the Princess to not outshine the members of her Knot.

One of the sleeves was too tight. No, not because of she had grown, her tutor dismissed her rationalization, but because her start and finish were too tight. This sleeve was also much longer than the other, and try as she might she couldn't explain how that happened. She had counted, she insisted. The tutor asked for her pattern notes, and of course Leia had none to show. The other sleeve, the shorter one, contained a run that coursed from the middle portion back to the beginning from when one of her stitches dropped. It also caused the fabric to be wider, and this sleeve did not fit either. Too wide.

One was too tight and the other too loose and short, but a girl wore her first sleeves with a new dress, dyed to match a shade lighter. Her sleeves were sapphire blue, because she liked the color. Leia did not alter the sleeves. She wore them once.

Leia looked at the stitches on her robe, and slid the spoke into one of the loops, and she moved it along the length with her finger. She nodded. The metal was smooth, the diameter close to size.

She pawed through the rest of the contents of the findings drawer, needing to find at least one more. The Captain had several spokes of different lengths and diameter. She wondered what they originally had been part of.

The next thing she would need was thread, and she went through the drawers. There was rope, wire, straps but no thread. She went back to the 'fresher, in case the Captain stocked a sewing kit, which would have been funny, but she didn't think she should look through his personal belongings. She would ask him.

He was inside a floor panel, his clothes dirty again. Luke was sitting on the floor, his legs dangling inside the panel, studying the striped socks, and holding a voltage meter.

"It's reading 30," Luke told Han.

"That's it?" Han asked. He seemed insulted.

"That's what it says," Luke said calmly in his mild voice.

Han sighed heavily and noticed Leia's feet behind Luke. "Don't bug me about communications," he groused at her. "I'm working as fast as I can."

"Maybe you should let the brains handle it," she retorted.

"He's the brains when it comes to rescuing princesses-" Han started to say.

"That's what I'm known for," Luke said and both Leia and Han were surprised into silence.

When Han spoke again, he told Luke, "So you grew a sense of humor. "How's the beard coming?"

"Shut up," Luke said.

"See, I got one, too."

"Which, the beard or sense of humor?" Luke said. "I don't see either."

Leia took in the easy banter of the two men, wondering again how long they had known each other. They were completely incongruous. Luke had told her he was with Obi Wan Kenobi, but it was these two men who led her out of the detention center, and then Kenobi was killed, so she hadn't gotten to talk to him. Luke was young, probably the same age as her, or close enough. The Captain, to whom she hadn't even been properly introduced yet, was older, and everything about him was darker. Not just his hair and eyes, but his whole personality, and it wasn't a factor of age.

Luke had told her all about his aunt and uncle and the moisture farm, how the man was General Kenobi to her but Old Ben to him. He had told her he just learned his father was a Jedi Knight and showed her the light saber bequeathed to him, which he only just received, and that Ben had started to train him in the ways of the Force. He asked her if she knew of other Jedi and told her he was going to join the Rebellion.

They knew each other mere hours, and already she knew so much about him.

All she knew of Han was he might be allergic to power. The rest she knew from Luke: he was Corellian, spoke in opposites, and did illegal things with his ship.

"Something you wanted, Princess?" the Captain had disappeared back into the floor.

"Yes." Leia stepped forward and squatted near Luke."May I use these?" She held out the spokes so he could see them.

He frowned at them, then frowned into her eyes. "Thought I asked you to solder the connections on the new board. You won't need those."

"I finished that. This is for something else," she told him.

"Oh. What do you want with them?" he asked, eyes looking at the spokes.

"I tore my robe. I want to fix it."

"Well," he drawled, returning to his wire repair with a crooked smile, "I can't see how running spokes through your robes is gonna fix it. Seems to me you'll poke yourself."

She looked at Luke and could see he also had no idea what she intended with the spokes. And since she determined they were equals she rolled her eyes but stayed patient. "Do you have any thread?"

The Captain hauled himself back up to floor level and sat near Luke. "How're you gonna get the thread through those loops using the spokes?" he asked with genuine interest.

"What do you mean?" she asked. She hadn't been the best stitcher in the Knot but even she felt it was fairly obvious.

"I thought, you know," the Captain waved his hand, "when you sew. The needle has a hole in it the thread goes through."

Luke was nodding sagely. "It does. My aunt darned all our clothes."

She wanted to snap at them. She wasn't going to darn, patch or sew. She was going to stitch, damn it, the way the gown had been made in the first place. She would recreate fabric from the air, just like the goddesses.

"Knitting," she told them. "Needles and thread."

The Captain spoke to Luke. "Isn't that what we said?"

"I think so," Luke nodded.

"It's not the same at all," she snapped, waving the spokes angrily under their noses. "These needles. Not tapestry ones."

"You have my shirt," the Captain offered. "Why don't you just use that?"

"You won't mind?" she asked. The color was close. Creamier, but it might do.

"You already did, right?" he said.

Leia fetched herself another of his clean shirts and sat on his bunk with scissors she grabbed out of the 'fresher'. She cut the hem off, ripping the thread out of its fabric and rolling it into a ball around her hand. She wouldn't need much. There was something oddly satisfying in the effort. An eye to a result, she figured. The Empire would probably kill her, but she would die in her gown without any holes.

A shadow darkened the threshold and she looked up.

"What are you doing?" the Captain demanded, looking at her lap and the thread wound around her left hand. "I meant _wear_ the shirt. I meant replace your torn robe. I meant don't destroy my property!"

She gaped at him. How could they have misunderstood each other so completely? She thought of her Knot, and her father. Even he would have understood her intent. Guiltily, she looked at the cut hem lying on his blanket. "I'm sorry," she said. "I thought, when I asked about thread, and you said use your shirt, and it's white..." she trailed off. "I'm only wearing your shirt until the gown is ready. I suppose I can fix this one, if you want me to. I'm not really all that fine a knitter," she confessed, "but-"

"Too late now," he said. "I'll just get a new one. I'd say do the same for your gown."

She straightened, feeling icy. "This is the uniform of a Senator," she said haughtily. "I've -"

"The Emperor's ditched the Senate," he commented carelessly.

"- what?"

"Made the news even on Tatooine," he said. "You must have already been on the Death Star?"

"I didn't know," she replied dully, not listening to him.

"Yeah. Want me to space it?"

"No!" She grabbed onto it protectively. "Your insensitivity is quite remarkable, Captain."

He made another face, an uncomfortable one. Leia kept her eyes on him as he left, thinking she might have just learned something else about him.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Luke was watching, hypnotized.

"Why do you need two?" he asked. They were in the crew quarters, she perched on the edge of the mattress and Luke resting on an elbow near the wall. He hadn't changed back into his own clothes yet. Han was still working, outside in the corridor.

"Well," Leia had to think to explain it properly. It hadn't been exactly the most natural thing she came upon when she was in the Knot. "This needle holds them in place. And you use this needle to work them." She demonstrated by working a few stitches.

"But why are they on a stick?" he persisted. "My aunt did something besides darning, but she still used a needle. I think. Not like this, the spoke. One with a hole. She made..." Luke's lips quirked in memory, "... circles. Pie cuts, or something."

"Picots?" Leia asked. Something similar had been on Alderaan. "Is it Basic language on Tatooine? We had something called that."

"That's it," Luke nodded. "I remember her doing it when I was little. Little holey cloths. They covered the tables."

"It's fascinating, isn't it, how beings so far away create similarly."

"Makes us not so different," Luke agreed. "It'd be a good way to build understanding for each other, wouldn't it? Maybe you could teach the Emperor."

That made Leia laugh. "I had to knit sleeves for my dress when I was young," Leia told him. "Weaving is pretty predominant on Alderaan. Was." Luke bowed his head. "In our mythology, the goddesses wove the planet from their hands."

Luke made a puzzled face and Leia smiled, for she knew he must be imagining something very odd. So she told him of Alderaan's creation, and the role of each goddess. It was fitting, she thought. He had told her all about his farm home in the desert, and a Princess's home was the planet. Plus, it was gone. But there was more to Alderaan than just that it wasn't anymore. It's existence had to be commemorated, so she would tell others about it.

"So what do you do with that one?" Luke interrupted her and pointed to the stitch she had just knit.

It was amazing how foreign this was to him that Leia was delighted to show him. "Nothing," she said. "It stays on. The stitches move from the left needle to the right. And you just repeat. It's not very hard, though I wasn't very good at it."

"Huh," Luke marveled. "Can I try?"

"Sure." She waited for him to sit up and perch beside her. "Like this. Under here, to the back, grab the thread and pull it forward. You finish where you started."

Luke grabbed the needles from her. "Like this? Then..."

"Forward," Leia laughed. "Come forward. Past that strand there, that's it. Oh no!"

Luke had failed to keep his fingers on top of his stitches and as he manipulated the spoke they slid out. "Did I ruin it?"

"No, not at all. Completely fixable." Leia took her work back from him and made sure the loose stitch was anchored on a needle. "Which is why I'm repairing it instead of throwing it out, which is what Captain Wonder Pants wants me to do."

"What did you call me?" Han hollered from across the room.

Leia stifled a laugh. It had slipped out.

"From Flyboy to Wonder Pants," Han mused. "I think I'm growing on her, kid."

"And when I reknit enough fabric to reach this end," Leia ignored him, for she would like it better if she grew on him. She indicated to Luke where the fabric was healthy, "I'll seam them together. Oh, I'm going to need a third spoke!" she realized.

"I'll get one," Luke offered.

Han took advantage of Luke's disappearance. He possibly had to hasten to get before her, which was an amusing image. He didn't sit. "Lemme see this."

Leia peered up at him. "Woman's work, Captain?"

"Did I say that?" he retorted, offended again.

"Probably you would if I hadn't first."

"Is it?" he wanted to know.

Leia thought it was a valid question, and he wasn't looking to argue. If Han had been listening to all she had told Luke, and for the first time since their escape, she felt an honest gratitude toward him. "No. Men do it, too. In fact, I can think of many that are Masters."

"The color's a little off," he remarked. "But in all, not a bad repair. You'll look all put together when we land."

"Yes," Leia agreed, "I will."

Luke returned with another spoke and took his place beside Leia again. "How much longer til we're out of hyperspace, Han?"

Han sighed. "Same answer I told you last time, only," he consulted his chrono, "thirty three clicks less."

"Which is..." But Han didn't bother to answer. He returned to his repair out in the corridor.

"You're anxious," Leia observed.

"I'm ready," Luke asserted quietly. "I want to get there."

Leia nodded. She did, but she didn't. She thought this quiet distraction- flying through hyperspace, repairs done, escape achieved- this quiet distraction was like….what? Home, in a way. Like stories she'd read, when there was a bad storm and families would gather in one room, talking and playing games together, riding out the danger. Instead of her Knot, fourteen girls, she had two men, and a Wookiee. She would need a new name for it, because Knots were specific to Alderaan….they were….they just were.

When they got to Yavin, she would have to endure the loss of Alderaan again. The Death Star would be behind them, Luke would join the battle as a fighter pilot, and the _Millennium Falcon_ would be on its way.

That was all right, Leia decided ruefully. A ship wasn't meant to stay in one place. Once knitting traveled from place to place and now war. She preferred the _Falcon_ smuggling word of war around the galaxy to the Empire actually bringing it.

Luke was evidently following a similar pattern of thought. "I had a friend back home who talked about joining the Rebellion. Now, after this, Alderaan..." His voice trailed away and he sneaked a guilty look at Leia. "Others are going to join," he told her. "Especially after this. The Empire will end. I don't think even he's going to be able to leave," he whispered to her.

"Who, Han?" Leia whispered back. "I don't know. He says he is."

"I don't see how he can. Not after what we've been through. Not for what we're facing."

Leia nodded. Han looked for excuses and spoke in opposites. She would bet he stayed. "Maybe we won't reward him until the battle is over. That'll be a good excuse for him to have to stay."

"He's pretty sure it's a lost cause," Luke said in an undertone. "So he'll demand the money before we all die."

Leia laughed, the inanity of Luke's words striking her. "We're going to die."

"We might. But maybe not," Luke said in a bright whisper.

"Maybe not." _The_ _Maybe Knot._ Leia was still fragile, deep down a wreck, but Luke reminded her there was hope. Always, until the bitter end.

She finished repairing the hole and cleaning the gown with the sonic. The ship wasn't done with all the needed repairs, but Han assured her it would hold for a while and that she would have time to brief Command before the Empire got close, because nothing was as fast as his ship. She looked at Luke while Han boasted and they both rolled their eyes, and that made them smile at each other.

She used the handheld and put her gown back on, and she could see a definite ridge where she had restitched the two ends of fabric together, but it didn't bother her. Knitting hadn't been her forte. Leading was.

Then she swept down the ramp, and greeted the generals with the plans and news of the Death Star's approach, and told them there was no time for sorrow. This was a lie; she would mourn her whole life, she knew it, but this was something else she learned while aboard the _Millennium Falcon._ It was true she was the Princess of Alderaan, but she didn't need their help, or their sorrow. She just needed them to destroy the Death Star.

Leia presented Han with his reward, which he had asked for, and gave Luke a soft kiss on the cheek, because he needed it. He was upset and angry that Han and Chewbacca left, but he told Leia Han said goodbye with a question: why don't you come with us?

What Luke didn't see was the captain had left it open ended. There was a hook he could hang a reason to return on.

Leia would watch the battle in the control center. Briefly, she let her thoughts flicker to the girls of her Knot. The gown's repair wasn't exactly an Alderaani method, but it was a tribute, and a promise. The upcoming battle was a kind of rite of passage, wasn't it, for her Maybe Knot. She would wait for them.

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 _Author's Note: Any real knitters out there? Since Han didn't have a darning needle in his toolkit, I had Leia do a three needle bind off on her gown._

 _Thank you for reading.  
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